A week ago, St. Louis Cardinals’ 2008 Photo Day was conducted from spring training camp in Jupiter, Florida. Featured here are the top ten prospects in the system.
Number one gets to go first. In spring training, Colby Rasmus is just one for his first seven (.143) at the plate, but there is a lot of March baseball still to be played.
Like Rasmus and Chris Perez, number two prospect Bryan Anderson played for Team USA last fall. Will the catcher make the step up to Triple-A Memphis this season at 21 years of age?
Lefty Jaime Garcia (#3) shook off elbow problems and seems poised to anchor the Springfield rotation in 2008, but shouldn’t need to stay there all season if he pitches to form.
Number four prospect Chris Perez was in college two years ago. Now the questions are about whether he can make the big club this year and replace Jason Isringhausen next.
Number five prospect Adam Ottavino is our top-ranked right-handed starting pitching prospect in the organization, coming off a strong campaign with Palm Beach (A-Advanced).
Fellow right-hander Tyler Herron (#6) is right on Ottavino’s heels after dominating the Midwest League in 2007.
The Rule 5 pick up from Cleveland, outfielder Brian Barton, slipped into our already-completed list at number 7a, just behind second baseman Jose Martinez (not pictured).
Joey Bombs, a.k.a. Joe Mather, our number eight prospect, has an outside shot at replacing Scott Spiezio if he can bring defensive versatility and a power bat off the bench.
After pitching for Gonzaga one year ago, our #9 prospect, Clayton Mortensen, quieted skeptics with an excellent professional debut and looks to build on that.
The organization’s 2007 Minor League Pitcher of the Year, P.J. Walters, came in a strong number ten on our top Cardinals prospect list.
Along with the above players, we have loaded onto our Scout.com Cardinals player profile pages fresh shots of every incumbent Cardinals player. In fact, over 120 photos have been added recently, with two more photo features like this coming later this week.
There are several ways to access player profile pages. Either enter the player’s name in the search box in the blue area on the upper right of this page or use the dropdown menu for "MINOR LEAGUE ROSTERS" in the red area to the right of The Birdhouse logo up top. Once you are on the player’s page, click on the area that says “Photos (xx)” next to his name to view all the photos in our gallery for the player.
Earlier articles in this series:
”2008 Cardinals Photo Day: The Newcomers”
All photos from Doug Benc/Getty Images.
© 2008 stlcardinals.scout.com. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, rewritten or redistributed.